Rubi Rivlin’s wakeup call to the nation

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One amongst few, Knesset Speaker Reuven Rivlin can only be praised for his integrity and open-mindedness.

In his speech at the Knesset memorial for Yitzhak Rabin, he intimated a few statements on reality that has been willfully if not criminally obscured for more than two decades now to the people of Israel, the ones who were told that the sacrifices they were making, in blood and treasure, as a result of the newly concocted “peace process,” were, so speak, “the price for peace.” In reality there was neither “process” nor “peace.”

Now let us, for a moment, go back to some relatively recent historical elements which are all well documented for all those who prefer to be in denial to examine before brainwashing the world, as they have succeed to do, with their different versions that suit their purposes of the moment.

WWI ended with an allied victory and the victors proceeded to divide the conquered territories by drawing lines on maps and at the same time eying their own interests. Thus the British took Mesopotamia, the Arabian Peninsula and Egypt under their protective wing. Palestine, however, under the Balfour Declaration, was assigned to become the National Home for the Jews. All these territories, by the way, were not countries but rather regional divisions of the Ottoman Empire . France carved Syria for its own future sphere of influence.

The San Remo Conference was followed by the League of Nations and the US Congress granting and approving a mandate given to the British known as the British Mandate for Palestine whose very specific provisions were to be abided by and which were not capable of being altered in any way. This was INTERNATIONAL Law.

However, by severing that part of Palestine east of the River Jordan to accommodate the Hashemite tribe who were kicked out from Hijaz in Arabia by their Saudi ‘brothers’ and imported to rule the eastern side of the river, Britain committed the first violation of its Mandate terms. The world looked the other way. Then the terms of the Mandate were violated again in the 30’s by restricting Jewish immigration and allowing unrestricted access for Arabs to flood the part west of the Jordan River whilst prohibiting Jews from entry in the eastern part. The world looked the other way.

When the United Nations was created as successor to the League it was to abide by all the previous commitments of the League but then proceeded to violate what concerned Palestine by proposing to partition the western side of the river in the manner engineered by the British to establish a Jewish State and an Arab one. Not withstanding the disadvantage imposed on the Jews who accepted the proposition

(see available maps of the proposed division) the Arabs not only rejected it but on the day of declaring the independence of the state of Israel seven Arab armies attacked the nascent nation with a view to totally destroying it and throwing any survivors into the sea. All these events are a matter of public records as opposed to the modern revised and changing versions being peddled in recent years. The then King Abdullah I sent his army outside the borders of his newly established kingdom- compliment of the British- and succeeded to invade part of Judea and Samaria which he annexed to his renamed Kingdom of Jordan. The world looked the other way.

Against all odds the Arabs were defeated and Israel prevailed and although the Arabs were obliged to sign a cease fire they refused to recognise the other signatory to the agreement.

Now back to today. Rivlin stated that “ in so small space between the Jordan and the Mediterranean Sea there cannot be more than one country”. Indeed therefore it is legitimate to ask what in the name of heaven successive Israeli governments were doing promoting the false and obscene merits of Oslo which cost the country the lives of so many of its people? It would be legitimate to ask why did it take over two decades for the Establishment to discover this fact that has been staring us in the face all along? Those of us, and many have had experience of the Arab mentality, who saw what was coming and opposed it were labelled by the Left as warmongers and enemies of peace. But let there be no misunderstanding: The old Left founded the state and many gave up their lives to bring it to flourish as opposed to the modern so-called “Liberal Left” who have, through their ignorance and arrogance brought nothing but a tragic and illogical situation through assuming that they only know best and all we hear from them are empty slogans whilst still flogging the same dead horse, thus damaging enormously the State of Israel and its people. After each war waged by the Arabs and their uninterrupted terror, boycott, defamation and libellous campaigns, Israeli governments pursued a policy of suing for peace with its unwilling defeated enemies thereby acting as a DEFEATED nation. It is unnatural for a country, attacked again and again if not continuously, to defeat its enemy and then begs to co-exist with which implies that the enemy has to disobey their religion and thus become apostate and we all know what that means.

Yes! The two-state solution IS dead. It was conceived in sin by people who should have known better and it was still-born from day one and with all due respect to Defence Minister Ehud Barak whose military career is perhaps second to none, his reported reaction to Rivlin’s speech that a two-state solution was more important than the Likud primary is way off the mark and also adds nothing new by trying to score a political shot. NO sir! What is more important is the future of Israel and the Jewish people who have had up to their eyeballs with the Establishment and political echelon crisscrossing from one party to another, adopting contradictory policies depending on the time of the day and if that does not work then forming another party with more holier than thou attitude and more sound bites that fundamentally add up to nothing tangible or meaningful. The bottom line when it comes to principles the only one that prevails is to grab a seat like it is done in musical chairs and hold on to it.

Having said this I am the first to admit that there are many things that everyone does not know which makes it very difficult to judge but there is one thing I do know and that is that the fate of the Jews has never been easy and the fate of Israel in today’s world is extremely difficult. However, Jews have to come to terms with two facts of life:

a) That Israel is the home of last resort for Jews

b) Grovelling to all and sundry is not going to endear us to the world as experience teaches us. We have above all to maintain our dignity and self respect If we want others to respect us.

We cannot subordinate our own interests to others because this will be a recipe for disaster and we have seen this in action. As far as the Palestinian Arabs are concerned we have to reassess our conduct with them to reflect the reality of the situation we find ourselves in at present bearing in mind that we have already tried the blind ally way with them. Therefore:

a) They and their ‘brotherly’ Arab nations have been conducting hostilities in different forms against the State since its independence and against the Jews before that which implies no possibility of co-existence with them since their religion advises otherwise.

b) By attacking Israel in 1948 the ensuing war resulted with a number of Arab refugees mostly of their making and encouragement but also some cases of expulsion as happens in every war. The numbers claimed by Arab sources in 1948- 1952 ranged from 200,000 to 550,000 to 2,000,000 and started escalating when UNRWA was created to maintain them and pass on their status from father to son apparently in perpetuity, contrary to how other war refugees are dealt with in the world. The money from the West continues to flow in abundance.

c) In Arab countries Jews who lived there predating Islam and were loyal to their rulers after the Arab conquest and helped create the institutions after they were given independence in the first half of the 20th century were subjected to persecution and treated as 3rd class citizens were forced to leave with all their substantial assets confiscated. 1948 war was but a justification.

d) The five further wars waged against Israel all ended with defeat of the Arab aggressors and each time what is referred to as the ‘International Community and the UN made sure that Israel should not obtain an unconditional surrender and impose a peace treaty on them. ( This is not cruel; It is the way wars are ended the world over)

But nowadays Israel finds itself in the dock thanks to the falsehoods and lies propagated by the Palestinian Arabs in particular and the Moslems and other Arabs in general who have been educating their youth to hate and kill the Jews i.e. as prescribed by the ‘religion of peace’. Israel is vilified, slandered, demonised, accused and attacked on all fronts. The world is still looking the other way and this emboldens the Arabs be they Palestinians or otherwise to maintain their direction. It was as though it was not enough with courting Arafat, the king of terror, the mantle has been taken over by his heirs Abbas and Saeb Erakat with their forked tongues. They feel that they are the ones that should impose their conditions of surrender on Israel ; they are the ones who decide what Israel should give or presumably temporarily keep; they want Jerusalem as the capital of their future? State; they want to implement the resolutions of the UN which they categorically rejected as from 65 years ago. They want compensation for this and that and an end to the “1967 occupation” and attribute to it all their failures with the exception of the rampant corruption which they continue to benefit from big time. The world is still looking the other way.

All this has got to change now because enough is enough.

First of all “the occupation” did not start in 1967, rather the occupation of Judea Samaria and the eastern part of Jerusalem ENDED in1967. Was the PLO established in 1964/5 in anticipation of liberating territories that was going to be occupied in 1967? They have the audacity to claim compensation for refugees: Really? On what grounds? For waging six wars against Israel and failing to achieve their objectives? It is the Arabs who should be compensating Israel for the damage they caused, for deaths they caused, for forcing a stage of siege on the state for 65 years.

Now we come to the question of the Jews expelled fro Arab countries. It is argued by certain quarters that compensation be made on the basis of offsetting one claim against the other. Indeed this is a novelty. The Arab refugees emanated from wars initiated by the Arabs against the State of Israel . It is beyond comprehension to explain why the Jews from Arab countries should come through a combined scheme. The world is looking…. as usual, the other way!

So Mr Rivlin you are one hundred per cent right if not more. The two state solution falls in the category of a bad dream. The experiment has been repeated umpteenth time and the result always comes up the same. So it is time to forget it. We can no longer, for the sake of political correctness and expediency mortgage the future of our country to what amounts to a scheme based on a hallucination leading forever to a dead end. We are supporting our enemies in Gaza with fuel, water and electricity and other supplies whilst they keep sending rockets. How do we explain this folly to our sons and daughters who are putting their lives on the line day and night to keep us safe? We have abandoned our values. substituted unity with division, drifted away from our fundamental interests for the sake of a photo op and a disingenuous hand shake so that the world will not be upset with us. But the world is upset with us; how much lower do we have to sink in order that they will not label us an “Apartheid Nation” even though people are coming on foot from Somalia , Eritrea , Sudan through Egypt risking their all to seek refuge and bask in the sun of our “Apartheid” ?

It high time therefore to separate the people from the land and abandon for good the concept of separating the land from the people.

There is an old saying: “It is better to have a wise enemy than a mad friend”.

In our case we seem to have none of the first and plenty of the other.

About the Author

Moshe Kahtan was born in Baghdad, but lived for many years in England. A banker by profession, he served as head of international of the London Branch of Edmond Safra's TDB/Republic National Bank Group and then as UK representative of IDB and IDB New York. In the 1990s he served as vice-chairman of Likud-Herut GB and was a regular contributor to Scribe Magazine, covering the Arab/Israel conflict. Moshe made aliya in 2008.